Driehaus Museum Celebrates The Art Of The Chair

On View

THE ART OF SEATING: 200 YEARS OF AMERICAN DESIGN

Chicago’s Driehaus Museum is using an unlikely object to weave tales of American culture throughout the last two centuries: the chair. On display through mid-August, “The Art of Seating: 200 Years of American Design” presents 37 chairs as varied as their designers–including Frank Lloyd Wright, Charles and Ray Eames, Eero Saarinen and Frank Gehry–that offer insights into the era in which they were created. Henry Bertoia’s 1952 large Diamond lounge chair for Knoll Associates (above), for instance, demonstrates the designer’s elegant use of metal in an industrial period. The piece contrasts others in the exhibit, like an 1875 Egyptian Revival side chair and a decidedly modern 2004 option by Vivian Beer, all showing the changing style of the times.